de l'encre au bout des doigts

They've witnessed countless tempests, these rocks. They've been hit by constant waves since the beginning of time, letting the water shape them slowly, letting it take away and change their roughness into smooth round surfaces.

She sits there in the harsh wind and the falling night, she tastes the salt on her lips, but it is allright as it is not hers. Her own tears have dried up long ago, she can't remember the last time she cried. Even her laugh is dry nowadays as it shoots out like a bullet. She doesn't feel that old even if her face and body say otherwise.

It is alright this salt from the sea, the dark moving water. This place is left alone by the common tourists, you have to live here to know where it is. First there is a road, then a small path between ferns and brambles. You cannot bathe here, and you cannot come by boat. It is a place for contemplation and rock climbing.

She used to come here even when she was little. These are her rocks. She knows all of them, she climbed and played and watched spiders crawl for hours. 

Nowadays she sits. 

There was a time when she stopped coming. She lived away and she came less and less to the village, and there was never enough time. Her children prefered regular beaches with sand and shells, and she didn't want to fight yet on another subject. So she gave in. Her children grew up, moved away… and she moved back here. Her house is modest, but welcoming and warm. An every day she comes here, after her work is done, she sit in silence and watches the sea. She works with numbers, she sorts out taxes and VAT for small companies and can do most of it online. 

She watches the sea, the sky, and listens to the waves crashing on the rocks. Her face tells nothing, she doesn't move, but she's focused on the waves and the noise. She looks peaceful, and yet, these waves, they are like her mind shouting her anger and frustrations after years of saying nothing. Her fists are never clenched (but her teeth are), to most friends and neighbours, she is a placid and almost boring woman. 

They simply don't know, do they…

A long as she can come back to these rocks she will be allright. One day, she might simply lay there, and close her eyes, and wait. And maybe the noise will stop, maybe everything will stop. And things will be allright, still.